The Many Sides To Sarah Lizewski
by backwardsthinker
Summary: Sarah Lizewski is patiently awaiting her letter of acceptance into the Shaolin Academy of Martial Arts. She has plenty to keep her busy though, with her band, her school work, her brother Dave in the hospital, and her new friend Chris D'Amico who might become something more. Things seem to get even more interesting when Superheroes and a drug lord are added into the mix. (Chris/OC)
1. The School Side

**Hello Everybody! This is a fanfic that I've thought about writing for awhile but just sort of procrastinated until about two weeks ago when I actually sat down and started writing. I'd be lying if I said the first chapter was my favorite, but I hope you still enjoy it. Anyway just a reminder that I don't own anything :)**

**Chapter 1: The School Side**

Bang! Bang! Bang! "Dave let's go. Pick up the pace a little," I yelled pounding my fist against the bathroom door. "Come on, hurry up!"

My brother cracked the door just enough so I could see the tooth paste dripping from his lips as he spoke. "Give me minute!" he shouted right before he slammed it back into my face.

"You've said that six times this morning." Remember that myth that girls take longer in the bathroom? What a bunch of bull shit. My idiotic brother had made me late twice already that week and I had no intention of being late again. "Your not the one that has to take the subway to school!" There was no response, which meant he had chosen to ignore me like he did every morning.

I had officially lost my patience. "GET OUT NOW!"

Dave finally managed to pull open the door all the way. He ran his fingers through his hair self-consciously and pulled out his glasses, placing them over his nose. "It's about time," I sighed.

"It's not my-" I cut him off not having any time to listen to his excuses. While it took my brother forty-five minutes to finish in the bathroom(I'm pretty sure half of that time was used up just to look at himself in the mirror), it only took me about twenty minutes tops. I had a system. I spent 3 minutes brushing my teeth, a minute and half washing my face, and approximately seven minutes applying make-up. I had to speed up the process that morning however, leaving no time for make-up, which was fine considering it wasn't really my style anyway. I only wore it to cover the hideous acne that normally covered my face. Thankfully the craters weren't too bad, so once I was done I skipped back to my room to get dressed.

Without bothering to look in a mirror, I grabbed the hairbrush that sat on top of my huge chest of drawers and quickly pulled out all of the tiny knots in my straight light brown hair that hung down to the small of my back. I slipped my pajamas off and jumped into my dull school uniform. "This just won't do," I smirked to myself. I grabbed a pair of purple and gray striped knee high socks and put my dark brown combat boots over top them. I looked down at my plain blue pleated skirt and white blouse. "Still too plain." I bit my lip and thought about what I could add. I then ran over to the dresser by my bed and pulled out a small clear tub of buttons. I picked through and grabbed one with Pikachu, one with R2D2 and C3PO, and another that said "Uniforms Cause Conformity." I placed them on my blouse and before leaving my room I grabbed my thick black rimmed glasses. As I swept down the steps I wrapped my blue tie around my neck.

Getting into the kitchen, I noticed my brother and my dad were both sitting at the table taking their good old time eating breakfast. I grabbed the bowl that my dad had put out for me and picked it up taking huge and quick bites of my cereal.

"Woah slow down there Sarah," my dad said after swallowing some of his own breakfast.

"I can't," I replied slamming my bowl down. "I'm going to be late again thanks to your son."

"In my defense I-"

I cut him off again. "Save it bud. I get the bathroom first tomorrow."

"Alright," he sighed. "You still coming to Atomic Comics this afternoon?"

"It's Thursday isn't it?" I said sarcastically with a smile on my face. "I really gotta get out of here."

I ran towards the door but before I could make my escape, my dad took notice to my altered uniform. "You're going to get detention again,"he said smiling over his hot cup of coffee. I rolled my eyes and smiled. "If you keep doing that you're not going to get that scholarship."

"I had the interview last week and they liked how unique I was," I curtsied looking down at my uniform once again. I was eligible for a scholarship at a two year program at the best martial arts training school in China, The Shaolin Academy of Martial Arts. It was my dream school and the single reason why I had accepted the scholarship to the school I attended now, Downton Cardinal Academy. My mom had been good friends with the principal and she promised that I would get a shining recommendation letter from her if I remained there through middle school and my first year of high school.

"Yeah, unique," I heard my brother mumble through his mouth full of cereal.

"Whatever," I grabbed my backpack and my orange polka dotted sweatshirt that hung on the banister at the bottom of the steps. "Bye!"

"Bye," My boys yelled back as I headed out the door.

* * *

The second I swung the doors to the school open the bell clanged and I sighed. There was no point in rushing to class if I was already late, once again, thanks to my useless brother. I strided down the hallway till I got to my class which was only about four rooms down. The door was already closed. I'm convinced that my homeroom teacher only did this so that any student late would have to take the walk shame up to her desk and back to their seat, making sure every little beady-eyed student was watching you. "Ah Ms. Lizewski, how nice of you to join us," the old bat of a teacher named Ms. Aster said."And I see you've managed to alter your uniform once again." I hated it when she gave me that condescending smirk.

"Really? I hadn't noticed." I said returning a sarcastic grin back to her.

"Detention Ms. Lizewski," she said spitting out each consonant slowly. "And please cover up those inappropriate buttons." Rolling my eyes as I did so, I took my book bag off and put my sweatshirt on. "Wear is your school blazer Ms. Lizewski?"

"I must have left it home," I shrugged. "Sorry."

"Just," she sighed in defeat. "Have a seat." I watched as she stumbled back to her desk and sat down giving me one last warning glare.I turned around on my toes to see all the nice little rich kids giving me judgmental stairs. I found an open seat in the back row right by the window next to none other than Chris D'Amico.

"Hey," I whispered to him as I sat down. He looked up, made eye contact with me, and then returned to the warm-up written on the dry erase board at the front of the classroom. Unlike that day I had purposefully sat next to Chris on many occasions. He was a shy kid, which to most people in school meant he was either boring or self-centered, but I thought he had a story to tell.

The rumors about his father were another major reason why most people tried to avoid him, but the way I figured it, if I wanted to judge him about his family's personal life than that gave him every right to judge me about my family's personal life. Don't get me wrong, I'm not ashamed of them but rumors do start to circulate when your mom dies of a brain aneurysm at the kitchen table, especially when your one of the least popular kids in school because you don't have as much money as everyone else.

The only time I was ever able to start up conversation with Chris was during class(even if he never did talk back) seeing as it was probably the only time he was seen without his eight foot tall bodyguard. I don't think he ever wanted to show off the fact that he was one of the richest kids in New York, but thanks to Mr. Big Man everyone was aware.

The rest of class went like it always did, slowly and painfully. After the bell rang I watched Chris's bodyguard pick him up to take him to his next class. He wasn't the only kid that walked around with a human brick wall, but he his was definitely the scariest.

I picked up my books and met my best friend Wen out in the hall to walk to our next class. "Good Morning," she sang with her usual gleaming smile stretched out on her face.

"Hey," I sighed.

"Late to school again huh?" she asked as we started to walk.

"How do you do that?"

"Do what?"

"That thing where you can tell that I was late by just a little sigh."

"I don't know," she shrugged. "Best friend intuition?" I gave her a small chuckle.

Wen and I met in the sixth grade when we were partnered up to do an art project together. I was pretty shy back then considering most of the kids that went to Downton had known each other since pre-school. Downton Academy was known for only allowing the most elite students into their program, and by that I mean they were all loaded. At first I thought Wendla Marshal was like most of the other kids that gave me strange looks because in their eyes I was a "poor little nothing", but it turned out I couldn't have been more wrong. Wen was and still is one of the kindest people I could have ever hoped to meet, in fact there were many times where I found myself getting jealous of her and how perfect everyone thought she was. To be fair though she was pretty close to it. Not only was she kind, but she was loyal, generous, and extremely talented. She was one the best guitar players that I had ever heard, and much better than me that's for sure. Her talent wasn't important to her parents however. They wanted Wen to be a lawyer.

"Oh by the way I may be late to Atomics this afternoon," I told her.

"Detention?" I nodded. "Why am I not surprised?" she said taking a better look at what I was wearing. If I could describe Wendla Marshal as anything it was definitely "Goody Little Two Shoes". I don't think she had a bad bone in her body. Just by looking at her you could tell. Her perfect wavy blonde hair hung down just past her shoulders with her bangs held back by her solid blue headband. She wore the traditional Downton Cardinal blazer with grey knee high socks, black and white sweet pea oxford shoes, and her skirt hung at the exact length that it was supposed to. Her only accessory was a string of pearls that hung around her neck that had been given to her by her Grandmother."Why can't you just fallow the rules like a normal teenager?"

I laughed, "Yeah because a teenager rebelling is so unheard of." As we entered our math class I said, "And besides who ever accused me of being normal? Have you seen my closet?" She laughed and gave me a small nod as we sat down. I was never one for "normal" fassion. I liked to wear things that didn't match and I loved layers. So what if I wore striped shirts with polka dotted shorts and plaid leggings? It's what I liked and what I liked was all that mattered.

* * *

The day passed on at an incredibly slow rate, even more so that usual. When the bell finally rang for lunch I was the first to leap out of my chair and head to the cafeteria. It's not that I had much to look forward to though. Wen and I had different lunch periods and that meant I was on my own. It didn't matter though because after having very little breakfast I was starving. I waited in line anxiously to buy lunch. At least one of the perks to going to Downton was the food. After having their chicken patties, I don't think I could ever go back to public school lunches again.

Sitting down at my usual table, I watched Chris D'Amico walk into the cafeteria with his bodyguard in toe. He and the big guy always sat at the table across from mine. I of course took this time to entertain myself by making silly faces at Chris trying to get him to laugh. Chris's bodyguard usually sat with his back facing me so thankfully he never saw me. In the several months that I had made it my mission to get Chris's attention, he had never said a word back to me and tried to avoid eye contact as much as possible, that was up until about a month ago when I finally got him to laugh.

From that point on Chris and I had had a silent understanding of one another. We were both forced into being outsiders, the only difference was at least I had friends outside of school.

Chris and I had more than just school in common. We had both been visiting Atomic Comics at least twice a week since we were about seven, but he never talked to anyone accept his brick wall or on occasion, his father. It's not that people didn't try to walk up to him because they did, his bodyguard just scared them off.

After months instead of avoiding eye contact with me at lunch, Chris would smile and then quickly look away so his bodyguard didn't notice. At this point I think Chris and I had actually had more than a silent understanding. We had a silent friendship.


	2. The Band Side

**Hello again! Okay so this chapter is a little shorter than the last but, I had trouble finding a good place to end it. Anyway I hope you enjoy and feel free to give me any kind of criticism or if you have any suggestions let me know! And just a reminder that I don't own anything!**

**Chapter 2: The Band Side**

"What's up bitches!" I greeted to the entirety of Atomic Comics as I entered with Wen by my side.

"Do you have to do that everytime we come in here?" Wen scolded. "You're going to get us fired." Wen and I had recently gotten a job performing at Atomics a few days a to help the owner Scott get a few more customers into the shop."It's bad enough that we're late."

"Scott doesn't care," I shrugged. "As long as we play he's happy."

"She gave a nervous shrug in agreement. "I'm gonna go set up."

"Okay," I replied and then started to look around to see if I could find my brother and the rest of the gang. I spotted the back of his bushy brown hair by the window and walked over just as I heard our friend Marty say, "Yeah, haven't you ever heard of one night in Spiderman."

Marty was the first to notice my appearance. "Hey, where have you been?" He smiled and put down his "Runaways" comic.

"Detention," I replied stripping off my sweatshirt and revealing my uniform.

"Nice button," he said looking at the one that said "Uniforms Cause Conformity".

"Thanks," I said stealing a chair from another table and sitting down at the end of theirs. "So what are guys talking about?"

"Not much," our other friend Todd responded not letting his eyes leave his comic.

"Yeah we were just talking about how much of an idiot your brother is," Marty added.

"What else is knew?" I laughed.

"Thanks guys," My brother mumbled.

"Hey," I heard Wen's voice from behind me.

The minute the boys saw her there backs straightened and gave her the biggest smiles they could possibly make while giving her a few awkward hellos.  
Despite being best friends, we were two very different people, but that's why we worked. She was the most uptight person I knew and I was probably the most easygoing. She always strived to be perfect and I always strived to be average. The biggest difference though was how well liked Wen was by our student body. Part of it was probably how nice and sweet she was, but the other part was probably how much money her dad had in his pockets. I of course would never tell her that's what most of her other friends thought about her. She was too naive and sweet, and I could never break her heart like that.

"So why are you late," Todd asked now seeming much more interested about what was going on around him. "Don't tell me you got detention too."

"I was waiting around for this one," she responded pointing at me.

"Ooh, Guess who?" Todd said looking out the window spotting Chris D'Amico's car stopping out front.

I watched Chris smile as he stared at the sign on top of the shop. He did that every time he stopped by. I always wondered if this was one of the few places Chris went outside of his home. Maybe this was the only public interaction he had on a normal bases.

My friends continued the conversation as I stared at Chris walking into the shop and stopping in front of a rack of comics. At that moment all I wanted to do was grab enough courage to stand up and go say hi to him while his bodyguard watched. Unfortunately my brother beat me to the punch, because the next thing I knew Dave was walking up to Chris . Before either of them could say a word, Chris's bodyguard told Dave to go away. I believe his exact words were "Fuck off."

Dave stepped back slowly and went back to our table with his eyes wide in fear. "Maybe we should get out of here for today," he brought down his voice.  
"But Wen and I still have to play our set," I said slightly dissapointed that he wanted to leave.  
"We watch you guys like every other day," he said. It was an exaggeration to say the least. In fact I don't think he had ever stayed for a full set before."I think we can skip one just in case that guy wants to kill me."

I looked back at the bodyguard and sure enough he was burning holes in the back of my brothers head. "Fine," I sighed. "Bye Todd, See ya Marty."

"Who says I don't want to stay," Marty smirked letting his sarcasm roll off his tongue as he and Todd scooted of their booth.

"Goodbye Marty," I said returning the smirk.

"Buy guys," Wen gave them a charming smile and the boys attempted to give one back but it just made them look like the adroable fools they are.

Turning to Wen I said, "You ready?"  
"Yep," she answered. "Everything's set up."

We headed over to our makeshift stage at the back of the shop where Wen had set up two mics and two stools. I sat down and adjusted my mic accordingly while Wen sat to my right and placed her acoustic guitar on her lap. As Wen tuned her guitar I decided to do the intro. "Sup everybody," I addressed to our audience. "This is Wen and I'm Sarah, and we still have yet to come up with a band name. Just like any other day, we didn't get much recognition from the people we called our audience. "We're going to play a couple songs for you guys today. I hope you enjoy them.  
I gave a nod to Wen letting her know I was ready. She strummed her guitar and I started to sing Shark in the Water by V V Brown.

Wen and I were the only two to have any real interest in music at Downton considering how much the school frowned up the arts. Wen and I played a lot in music class together see as we were the only two that enjoyed it. That's when we came up with the idea to start a band about a year ago.

About an hour later as we started to finish up our set, I noticed that Chris hadn't left yet. On a normal day Chris might have listened to the first two or three songs while he read his comics. That day was different. Chris sat at an empty table and listened to our entire set and actually watched us perform. When our set finally ended I wanted to thank Chris for staying but it seemed like his bodyguard was in a hurry because he was pushing Chris out the door.

"I'll be right back," I said to Wen. Grabbing all the courage I could muster up I ran outside to find Chris about to slide into his car. His bodyguard had only just opened the door for him when I yelled out his name.

His bodyguard stopped me before I could get to him. "Didn't you here what I told your friend? I said 'Fuck off'."

"It's okay Carl," Chris said patting the very large man on the back. "Give me a second."

_Carl_? I thought to myself. _He somehow just became much less intimidating to me._

"Chris we really gotta go. We stayed in there longer than we should have."

"I won't keep you," I said to Chris. "I just wanted to thank you for listening to our set. Not a lot of people stay to listen to us."

"It's cool," he replied. I could hear a lisp that I had never noticed before. Then again he didn't speak to me that often. "I've allways wanted to stay and listen to your full set. Your really good; you and your friend. "

"Christopher, we have to go. Now!" Big Man Carl yelled while after speaking to the driver.

"I'll let you go," I said awkwardly. "Sorry to bother you."

"You didn't bother me at all. I'll see you at school tomorrow." I gave smile goodbye and turned around. I was a few steps away when I heard him stutter out,"B-by the way, I love what you did with your uniform!" I felt a blush creep up my face as I entered back into the shop.

I walked back over to Wen who was zipping up her guitar case. "Okay, what is up with your obsession with that guy?" she asked.

"I'm not obsessed," I defended myself. "I'm just fascinated."

"By what exactly?" she asked. "The fact that no one can get within two feet of him without being threatened by big his enforcer."

"No," I said. "And Carl isn't that bad."

"Carl?" she said. "Since when do you know his name?"

"Since about five seconds ago." She rolled her eyes and picked up her case. "Do you want to get some coffee and hang out for awhile before we leave?"

"Can't," she said. "I promised my dad I'd be home before six." I nodded and we started towards the door when she said, "And don't change the subject. Do you like him or not?"

"I don't know him well enough to answer that question yet," I replied. "I just think he needs a friend."

Leaving the shop we decided to take the short cut home, which on most days I wouldn't have taken seeing as it's where all the gangs hang out, but Wen was in hurry to get home. So there we were heading down an alley when two assholes came up to us. "Hello ladies," they said taking out their knives as they spoke.

"And what can we do for you gentlemen," I said with a smirk rising on my face.

"Sarah don't," Wen said becoming more afraid every second.

"Phones," the mugger with the tattoos covering his body demanded.

"And your bags too," the other said raising his knife a little higher.

"No thanks," I said.

"Sarah," Wen whispered again.

"I like that you think your all special because you have a knife," I said taking off my back-pack and digging around inside. "Because guess what?" I pulled out what I was looking for. "I have one too." I held up my knife so they could see. "The one thing my mom taught me about being in the city was always carry a means of defense. And while I'm sure she meant pepper spray, I think knives are a little more effective don't you?" The two boys backed up a little in shock but were by no means scared. "Did I mention I was a black belt?" They charged at me at I got ready to fight. After kicking the tattooed man in the gut, I managed to punch the other guy in the face two or three times knocking him out. The tattooed got back on his feet and I punched him as well before kicking him back again. That got him scared and before I knew it he was gone. "That was a little too easy," I smiled back at Wen.

"Sometimes I wish you wouldn't do that," she sighed in relief.

"I just saved both of our asses and you're saying I shouldn't do that," I said taking deep breaths between each word.

"I'm just worried your gonna get yourself killed one of these days," she said.

I looked down at the mugger who I knocked out to see him stirring around. "Let's get out of here before he realizes what just happened.


End file.
